12.1 Sophisms Sophisms as an intellectual fraud Sophism as a deliberate deception Disadvantages of the standard interpretation of sophisms

Sophisms as an intellectual fraud

Sophisms are usually spoken casually and with obvious conviction. And in fact, is it worth staying and reflecting on such, for example, reasoning:

“The seated rose; who stood up, he stands; therefore, the seated stands ”;

“Socrates is a man; man is not the same as Socrates; therefore Socrates is something other than Socrates ”;

“This dog is yours; he is the father; does he mean your father?

And what is such, say, “proof”: “In order to see, there is no need to have eyes, because without a right eye we see, without a left one also see; except for the right and left, we have no other eyes, so it is clear that the eyes are not necessary for sight ”! Or such an unexpected "conclusion": "But when they say:" stones, logs, iron ", then this is - silent, but they say"!

Sophism "Horned" became famous in ancient Greece. And now he wanders from encyclopedia to encyclopedia as a “model”. With his help, you can assure everyone that he is a horn: “What you have not lost, you have; you did not lose the horns; it means you have horns. ”

However, horns are a trifle in comparison with what can be proved at all with the help of this and similar arguments. Convincing a person that he has horns, hooves and a tail, or that any arbitrarily taken father, including not a human being at all, is just his father, etc., only through deception or breach of trust . And this is what the criminal code says is fraud. It is no coincidence that the teacher of Emperor Nero, the ancient Roman philosopher Seneca, in his Letters compared sophisms to the art of magicians, regarding manipulations that we cannot say how they are performed, although we firmly know that in reality everything is not done the way it seems to us.

Sophism as a deliberate deception

In the usual and widespread understanding, sophism is a deliberate deception based on a violation of the rules of language or logic. But deception is subtle and veiled, so that it is not immediately and not everyone can reveal it. Its purpose is to give a lie for the truth. To resort to sophisms is reprehensible, as well as deceiving and suggesting a false thought.

The sophistry as an error made intentionally, with the intention of misleading someone, is usually contrasted with paralogism, understood as an unintended error in reasoning, due to a violation of the laws and rules of logic. Paralogism seems much preferable to sophistry, since it is, in essence, not a deceit, but a sincere delusion and is not connected with an intention to substitute truth with a lie.

Most often sophisms are associated with an insufficient self-critical of the mind and the inability of it to draw proper conclusions, with its desire to embrace what is so far beyond its control. Often sophistry is simply a defensive reaction of ignorance or even ignorance, not wishing to admit its impotence and give in to knowledge.

Sophism is traditionally considered a hindrance in the discussion and in the dispute. The use of sophisms leads the reasoning aside: instead of the chosen topic one has to talk about the rules and principles of logic. But in the end, this obstacle is not something serious. The use of sophisms from the point of view of the problem under consideration has a purely external character, and with a certain skill in logical analysis of reasoning, it is easy to detect and convincingly refute sophism. Sophisms sometimes seem so casual and frivolous that the famous German historian of philosophy V. Windelband referred to them as jokes: reasonable criticism of everyday habits. "

So, sophistry is just inconsistent proof, an attempt to pass a lie for the truth. It has a random, non-substantive character and is a purely external obstacle in the way of the discussion. It follows that no deep and requiring special explanation of the content is not behind it. In sophistry as a result of the deliberately incorrect application of semantic and logical operations, there are also no real logical difficulties. In short, sophistry is an imaginary problem.

The disadvantages of the standard interpretation of sophisms

This is the standard interpretation of sophistry, which is captivating by its simplicity. Behind it is a centuries-old tradition. However, despite the apparent evidence, too much it leaves unsaid and unclear.

First of all, it is completely distracted from those historical circumstances in which sophisms were born and in which their subsequent, often eventful life proceeded. The study of sophistry, torn from their habitat, like trying to get a complete picture of plants, using only herbariums.

Sophisms exist and are discussed for more than two millennia, and the intensity of their discussion has not decreased over the years. If sophisms are merely tricks and verbal tricks brought to light by Aristotle, then their long history and steady interest in them are incomprehensible.

There are, of course, cases, and perhaps not uncommon, when errors in reasoning are used with the intention of misleading someone. But this clearly does not apply to ancient sophisms.

When the first sophistries were formulated, the rules of logic were not known. To speak in this situation of intentional violation of the laws and rules of logic can only be a stretch. There is something else. After all, it is not serious to assume that with the help of “Horned” sophistry one can convince a person that he is a horned man. It is also doubtful that with the help of the “Bald” sophism someone hoped to assure others that there are no bald people. It is incredible that sophistic reasoning can make someone believe that his father is a dog. Speech here, obviously, is not about "horned", "bald", etc., but about something completely different and more significant. And just to emphasize this circumstance, sophism is formulated in such a way that its conclusion is deliberately false, directly and sharply contradicting facts.

The emergence of sophisms is usually associated with the philosophy of the sophists (Ancient Greece, 5th – 4th centuries BC), which justified and justified them. However, sophisms existed long before the sophist philosophers, and the most famous and interesting were formulated later in the philosophical schools established under the influence of Socrates. The term “sophistry” was first introduced by Aristotle, who characterized sophistry as imaginary, not real wisdom. They included the aporia of Zeno, directed against the movement and the multiplicity of things, and the arguments of the sophists themselves, and all those sophistries that were opened in other philosophical schools as sophisms. This suggests that sophistry was not an invention of some sophists, but rather something common to many schools of ancient philosophy.

Characteristically, Socrates were also sophists for the general public, and Aristotle himself was also a payer. It is no coincidence that Aristophanes in the comedy "Clouds" presented Socrates as a typical sophist. In a series of dialogues of Plato, a man who tries to confuse his adversary with boggy issues sometimes looks more like Socrates than Protagoras.

The widespread prevalence of sophisms in ancient Greece can be understood only by assuming that they somehow expressed the spirit of their time and were one of the features of the ancient style of thinking.

The relationship between sophisms and paradoxes is another topic that is not developed within the usual interpretation of sophisms.

In contrast to sophisms, paradoxes are interpreted with all seriousness: the presence in the theory of paradox speaks of the apparent imperfection of the assumptions underlying it.

However, it is obvious that the line between sophisms and paradoxes is not any definite. In the case of many specific arguments it is impossible to decide on the basis of the standard definitions of sophistry and paradox, to which of these two classes should the given arguments be attributed.

The separation of sophisms from paradoxes is so vague that quite a number of concrete arguments are often explicitly referred to as sophisms, which are not yet paradoxes or are not related to paradoxes yet. This is the case, in particular, with the considered further sophistries "Medimn grain", "Covered", "Protagoras and Euatl" and a number of others.

It is already clear from general considerations that the situation with sophisms is far from being as simple as it is customary to imagine. Their standard interpretation has developed, of course, not by chance. But it obviously does not exhaust the whole essence of the matter. A special, and, moreover, concrete historical analysis is needed, which alone is capable of showing the narrowness and limitations of this interpretation. At the same time, he must reveal the role of sophisms in the development of theoretical thinking, and, in particular, in the development of formal logic.